Milk in tea. The eternal debate.

Over the last year, I’ve been trying really hard to try and have less milk in my tea (and coffee for that matter). But it’s actually really hard. As someone who grew up drinking milky tea and coffee, both with sugar, it took me many years to wean myself off of sugar alone. Milk, however, seems to be even harder. Mostly because it really does change the whole taste of the drink. While sugar obviously just adds sweetness to a tea or coffee, milk alters the whole flavour of a tea or coffee. My partner is incapable of drinking tea with milk in it and equates it to adding milk to Pepsi: it just doesn’t make sense to him! So as I’ve been wanting to limit my dairy intake, he’s a good person to have around as he always drinks tea and coffee black.

Drinking milk-less overseas

Back in 2012, I went on a trip to Greece and Turkey. While there, I drank many traditional Greek coffees and also Turkish teas and coffees, which do not have milk in them. And you know what? I LOVED them! Turkish black tea was so delicious. It wasn’t sweet at all, but was similar to drinking English Breakfast tea without milk, which at the time I would never do. So why did I enjoy it so much at the time? Possibly the excitement that I was drinking an exotic tea in an exciting country I’d never been to before helped. Another thing that could have added to this was that Turkish tea was always served in these small, beautiful glasses. These were so lovely to drink from, and also meant I wasn’t trying to drink a gigantic mug of tea without milk. Turkish and Greek coffee was stroooong and also very gritty towards the end of the pot/cup, but I enjoyed every one I tried. I’ve been meaning to buy a coffee pot to make Greek/Turkish style coffee ever since – I should probably get onto that!

But why is coffee so much easier to drink without milk?

Honestly, I have no idea! Coffee generally has a stronger taste than tea, so surely drinking it black would be very strong? But for some reason, I can happily make a filtered coffee, or a plunger coffee and drink it without milk. And as mentioned, Greek and Turkish coffees, even though they’re so strong, were totally delicious for me.

Flavoured tea it is then!

Very recently (the last week), I’ve been trying again to go milk-less in my tea. At cafes this can be awkward if sometimes the tea is too strong – milk doesn’t always make strong tea better, but it certainly makes it more drinkable. However, my sneaky trick to going milk-less with black tea? Flavoured black tea. Luckily for me, T2 is amazing and have a huge variety of flavoured black teas which I can happily drink without milk, most notably, Melbourne Breakfast and Madagascan Vanilla. As they have a whole lot of different delicious breakfast blends, I’ve just recently purchased New York Breakfast and Brisbane Breakfast, both of which are amazing. So that’s a big bonus. However, sometimes I don’t always have to time to set up loose leaf tea to make a cup, and just need to grab a teabag. This is where it gets tricky – but persistence is key!

Hopefully, as I work my way through flavoured black teas, I can eventually get myself to drinking my usual Yorkshire Tea – but without milk! Only time will tell.